Annual Sessions

The 24th Annual Session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly will be held in Helsinki, Finland on 5-9 July 2015. The theme for this year's Session is "Recalling the Spirit of Helsinki," a reference to the OSCE's founding document, the Helsinki Final Act, which was signed in the Finnish capital in 1975.

The Session will coincide with the Final Colloquium of the PA's Helsinki +40 Project, which is marking the milestone anniversary of the Final Act with seminars throughout 2015.

The Session will culminate in the adoption of the 2015 Helsinki Declaration, which will contain the Assembly's wide-ranging policy recommendations for the OSCE and its participating States in the fields of political affairs, economics, the environment and human rights.

The 23rd Annual Session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly was held at the Fairmont Hotel Congress Centre in Baku, Azerbaijan from 28 June to 2 July 2014 under the theme "Helsinki +40: Towards Human Security for All."

Hosted by the Milli Mejlis (Parliament) of Azerbaijan, the Session was attended by nearly 300 MPs from more than 50 OSCE participating States.

The 23rd Annual Session also featured a special debate on "The Rise of Extremism, Radicalism and Xenophobia: Challenges for the OSCE Region" (29 June), as well as a debate on the situation in Ukraine (1 July).

The 22nd Annual Session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly was held in Istanbul, Turkey from 29 June to 3 July 2013.

The Turkish Grand National Assembly hosted the annual gathering, which took place at the Lutfi Kirdar International Convention and Exhibition Center in Istanbul.

The session's Helsinki +40 theme underlined the Assembly's support for the OSCE Ministerial Council decision in Dublin to launch a set of objectives aimed at strengthening the OSCE towards 2015, the 40th anniversary of the Helsinki Final Act.

The 20th Annual Session of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly was held from 6 to 10 July 2011 in Belgrade, Serbia, under the general theme of "Strengthening the OSCE's Effectiveness and Efficiency -- A new start after the Astana Summit." It concluded with the elections of Assembly Officers and the adoption of the Belgrade Declaration, available in all six official langauges.

More than 230 parliamentarians from 53 countries voted on 10 July to pass the Belgrade Declaration, a political document filled with recommendations for national parliaments and the Organization for Security and Co-operation Europe on economic, security and human rights issues. The document contains resolutions on issues including human rights in Belarus, cyber security, human trafficking, hunger, internet freedom, nuclear safety and organ trafficking.

Under the general theme of “Rule of Law: Combating Transnational Crime and Corruption,” the OSCE PA’s 19th Annual Session took place from 6 to 10 July in Oslo. Hosted by the Parliament of Norway, the Storting, the Annual Session debated resolutions dealing with various dimensions of the theme, as well as 35 supplementary items covering a wide range of topics. Around 250 parliamentarians participated in the meeting.

At the closing plenary, the Assembly adopted the Oslo Declaration containing resolutions ranging from issues such as the situation in Kyrgyzstan to the Parliamentary Assembly’s involvement in the Corfu process, the peace process in the Middle East, nuclear security, cybercrime, the situation in the Arctic, the right of return of internally displaced persons, investigative journalism, and the death penalty.